It’s more than just putting “for your glory” in your prayers… what’s the essence of it?

I want to do a survey right now

• Everyone stand. I want you to think of a number – the # of minutes that you spend each day in prayer in an AVERAGE DAY. Let’s say over the last 6-12 months, what do you think would be the average. Don’t be too hard on yourself, but don’t be too easy either… GOT A NUMBER? RAISE YOUR HAND if you have one in mind.

• Ok, if you spend less than 5 minutes per day

• If you spend less than 15 minutes per day

• If you spend less than 30 minutes per day

• If you spend less than 45 minutes per day

• If you spend less than 60 minutes per day,

• If you spend less than 120 minutes (2 hours) per day, sit.

• OK, everyone sit.

If you looked around and thought – O, good, I’m above average, you missed the point.

MY JOURNEY:

I am passionate about reaching lost people. I pastor a Bible Methodist Church in a lower-income area of Oklahoma City. It’s a place where the helicopter circles more than once a week, with its spotlight shining down. . . a place where my neighbor across the street is doing six years in prison because he had way too many drugs and $6,000 in cash in his bureau drawer the night the police raided his house. . . the neighbor next to him is far more well-off financially, but we had to call an ambulance a few months ago when he passed out in his driveway from a marijuana reaction. You get the picture.

Church grew… from 20 to 70. Maybe I got busy, maybe I got careless. Maybe it was when my first or second child was born. Don’t really remember.

Somewhere in there, I stopped focusing on prayer as I should.

Then it “grew” like a bar of soap. For the next 2 years, back down to 40.

I began getting desperate.

God was setting me aside to teach me some lessons. I set aside a lot of time for reading and soul-searching.

We began spending every other Wednesday night in prayer, and still do.

We began seeking God’s face.

And so, I am speaking to you today not as someone who has all the answers – I’m just a young, dumb kid who God is taking on a journey into prayer, and I want to share with you one of the three passages I’ve been living in for the last year.

Luke chapter 11…

Luke 11:5 And he said unto them, Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go unto him at midnight, and say unto him, Friend, lend me three loaves;